Leopards and Tigers and Leeches, Oh My!

I was not going to post before our upcoming adventure but I found myself with a free afternoon and no energy to do anything. So I decided to follow Ben to the internet cafe and blog a bit while trying for the one millionth time to download Heroes. A friend of ours has the four episodes we have yet to see but I do not know when I can get my hands on them so I keep trying to download at least one episode. So far after days of effort I am up to 65 out 517Mb. If I wait here for four more hours I will have the whole episode. Sadly, it is tempting! Anyway, I digress.

All your warnings of giant fanged leopards, boa constrictors, and 12 inch leeches have struck a cord. It is a widely known fact that I am a giant coward. Everytime I go into the woods, climb a mountain, jump out of an airplane (okay I only did that once), or even ride my bike down a big hill without using my brakes, I am struggling against my deep-seated cowardice.

Unlike some cowards my fear always begins after the initial excitement over doing something fun and different. What I mean is that at first when someone says let's go for a motorcycle ride or dive off those rocks, the first thing that comes to mind is not fear or worry for my safety but wow that sounds like fun. But of course, the fear is not far behind and inevitably, no matter how many times I may take chances, my imagination starts working overtime and before you know it, what began as simply an exciting idea has turned into a paralyzing challenge. The result is (as too many of you already know) that I do overcome the paralysis but only with much coaxing, pleading, and even necessarily loud commands given through gritted teeth. Once I heed the pleas, I, of course, have a great time and forget why I even hesitated but I wish I could not encounter the fear altogether. So basically I am a conflicted coward.

This upcoming adventure in the jungle is no different. When we first started planning our trip all I could think about was how cool it would be to walk through a rainforest for hours, maybe encounter some unique animals I had never seen before, and then pitch our tent on an empty, isolated beach for two days of relaxing, swimming, and exploring. It sounded perfect to me. Even the strong possibility of encountering tiny leeches that could crawl through your clothes and suck your blood for hours without you knowing it didn't thwart my enthusiasm. I just kept telling myself that they fall off when they are full, much better than ticks which hanging on for dear life. But then, someone somewhere said 'be careful of the monkeys' or 'you aren't afraid of the animals or the dark rainforest' and my mind clicked over. All of a sudden I realized that Ben and I would be deep in the rainforest all alone with slippery rocks to scale, vipers, wild pigs, maybe even crocodiles (though the park brochure does not advertise them, our teacher told us they were in every river in Malaysia and what if those salt water crocodiles in the park nearby decided to migrate our way. I mean who knows right!) to run into, and possibly crazy cannibals that no one even knows about (who would find our headless bodies?). And wasn't it possible that we could be isolated all alone on that beach just when another tsunami hit SE Asia.

The real scare though, actually hit when I was out running the other day. I was out just at dusk and had run down to the edge of campus where the jungle really took over. There were no cars, motorcycles or people in sight anywhere. The brave me had intended on taking the unpaved road along the jungle back up and around to the main road but once I hit the turning point I had second thoughts because as I turned the corner I ran right into about 15 to 20 monkeys. Now admittedly these monkeys are small, maybe 10lbs tops but they look at you and watch you as if to say 'if I got you alone we might just tear you to pieces or tickle you to death' (I don't know they are not exactly hostile but still scary somehow). Well, I decided immediately that I did not want to give them a chance to get me alone, especially since I was at that point way too tired to run away at any kind of pace so I, of course, doubled back and took the big road. But all the while I was looking back over my shoulder fearful they were following and starting at every noise that shook the trees in the jungle alongside me. It was then and there that the real fear took hold and ever since I have been doing battle to keep it at bay.

No worries though, I am still so excited about this trip and even hope to encounter lots of animals but I am also sure that Ben will be doing a lot of teeth gritting along the way and I won't sleep a wink. Wish us luck and pray that those salt water crocodiles really did not migrate our way! StB